You moved in next door.
I introduced myself.
You hugged me and adjusted your cap.
 
I watched the awed crowd at the Acme
as you mimed Deniro in ‘Taxi’
and was with you when you u-turned
your VW  at a yellow light
instead of making a decision.
 
I was the only neighbor who knew
you let the dog out and got the paper
in bra and panties, explaining over coffee 
that you didn’t leash Lassie either and
 
besides no one’s up that early.
 
Pickles and milk for breakfast,
mescaline for lunch.
 
Don’t knock it ‘til you’ve tried it,
by the way its best with jazz.
 
Sat bewitched watching
‘Once upon a time in the West’,
read all of Kafka,
Kierkegaard and Sartre.
 
And then there was the room.
Three boulders and a sheet of slate
coffee table where you studied
your round rock collection
and hung hundreds of  drawings of navels -
covering the walls and ceiling,
 
self portraits,
 
you said, but no two were alike.
 
They boarded up your house
when you disappeared,
the neighborhood pretended
you never happened.
 
I’m working now and have my own place.
The drawing you gave me
is on the door to the freezer
and I think of you like ‘getting a beer’ often -
or when someone mentions
belly-buttons or conformity.
 
There are polished stones in the fridge
on the shelf next to the pickles.